Hardware

We’ve had some questions about what kind of hardware we’re developing the software on, so I’ve decided to write an entry about it. As we describe in the FAQ, we’ve decided on Linux on x86 as the target platform, and we’ve built a development cluster accordingly. We have 5 Linux servers of varying configuration: 1 database server, 2 application servers, and 2 load balancer/firewall servers:

Database. The database layer is the heart of the system. It houses the database, and controls access to the data.

Application. The application layer is where all of the business logic is performed. It then asks the database layer to make any appropriate changes to the data.

Network. The network layer allows for communication between the servers and to the clients.

This image gives a logical overview of the setup:

Using this configuration as a baseline, as we develop the software, we can do load testing to determine exactly what kind and amount of hardware we need to support the load of PINES. However, from what we’ve seen in our testing so far, the production cluster may look very similar to the current development cluster.